The Road to Riches: Blacksmithing (Seeking Follow-up Reads)

Holy Radiance Calendar year 1005, Month of Budding.

Some time had passed since Levi's Breathing Technique broke through to the Third Order.

During this period, Levi carefully studied the miscellaneous books about Wizards that Knight Fred had collected for him, as well as those books related to Animal Taming.

His Animal Taming proficiency rose rapidly.

It was Levi's first time experiencing proficiency increasing just from reading books.

Before long, the Animal Taming skill broke through.

Levi-----

Animal Taming: Second Order (1/5000)

And Levi had only read a small portion of the books related to Animal Taming.

The Emerald Kingdom had many circuses, and different circuses all had their own understanding and unique points when it came to Animal Taming techniques. Every time Levi read these books, he benefited greatly. Besides that, all kinds of peoples, especially those living in wild regions such as high mountains and grasslands, had many who understood profound Animal Taming arts. So, just by reading books, Levi felt he could grind up his Animal Tamer level.

Besides reading, he would also put some of the theories from the books into practice on the Three Little Bears, and these could also increase his proficiency.

As for Levi's Breathing Technique, it had only increased by a few hundred proficiency points this month.

If he wanted to grind it to the ten-thousand mark and break through to knight, under normal circumstances, it would take about two years.

"The Black Snake Secret Medicine needs to be put on the agenda."

Levi began to feel a headache. Right now, the territory's cash flow was only a few dozen Gold Coins.

Besides that, there were the dozens of cows and more than a hundred sheep in the manor. All these things together were worth no more than a hundred Gold Coins, and they could not be sold off either. These were the foundation those Serfs depended on for survival, and also an important source of Levi's daily dairy and meat products.

Levi would not do something like draining the pond to catch the fish.

If Levi had not sold the Mountain Sitting Wolf pelts he had hunted during this past period for a decent price, he might not even have been able to keep the pot boiling.

"Getting rich, getting rich. How should I get rich? Or rather, how should I use my Proficiency Panel to get rich?"

Just then, Knight Fred walked in and said with a worried face, "Young Master Levi, Little Blacksmith Milan asked about his father again."

"His father is living just fine in the Boar Gang right now. He's already their chief blacksmith. I've told him that I'll definitely think of a way to save his father, but given the current situation... wait."

Levi suddenly remembered something. He and Knight Fred rode the only two horses in the territory and hurried over to Little Blacksmith Milan's house in a rush.

At this moment, Little Blacksmith Milan had a worried face. It had already been more than a year since his father was taken by the Boar Gang. Although the Lord had said he would help him rescue his father, up to now, he had not seen the Lord make any move.

"Little Milan, are you still worrying about your father?" Levi came slowly on a tall horse, wearing a black cloak and Knight Armor.

"Lord, y-yes." Little Milan knelt on the ground and said.

Levi helped Milan up.

"I can understand how you feel, but your father is very safe in the Boar Gang right now. The territory is currently in a difficult period, and we still cannot start a war with the Boar Gang. If we had fifty sets of Knight Armor right now, I could lead Knight Fred to attack the Boar Gang this very moment and save your father."

Levi spoke calmly.

Little Milan lowered his head, his voice trembling. "Fifty sets?"

For this world, fifty sets of armor—let alone a little Baron's territory like Levi's, even some small Count's territories might not necessarily be able to produce that.

Moreover, with Little Milan's skill, he was still not capable of making things like armor that required superb blacksmithing technique. That was something only a Formal Blacksmith could make.

But in Blackwater Valley, the only Formal Blacksmith was his father, Old Toby. Old Toby could only make two sets of armor a year... fifty sets was simply an astronomical number, requiring an extremely huge amount of manpower, material resources, and wealth.

"Don't worry. I'll do everything I can to help you."

"Starting tomorrow, move into the castle and teach me forging and smelting techniques."

Levi said.

"Ah?... Lord, how could such dirty work trouble you?"

Little Milan said in shock.

"It's settled."

After Levi finished speaking, he toured the blacksmith shop, carefully watched the forging process once, then took the only introductory forging book from the blacksmith shop and left with Knight Fred.

"You're really planning to learn forging?" Knight Fred asked, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

"Yes," Levi said.

In this world, wars were endless, and productivity was extremely low.

Most territories also followed a self-sufficient small peasant economic model.

Levi had thought it through. If he developed other agricultural products, they definitely would not be very competitive, especially since Blackwater Valley was not suited to developing agriculture in the first place.

But if he could develop forging, from the most basic farming tools to weapons, and even armor, it absolutely had very good prospects.

As a lord, he knew how valuable things like armor and weapons were.

If he could develop the forging industry in the territory, then when he cultivated in the future, he would no longer be short of money.

And the reason he was so confident was naturally because of his Proficiency Panel.

As he spoke, Levi opened the Proficiency Panel.

A new skill had appeared on it.

Levi----

Forging: First Order (1/1000)

All along, Levi had been limited by the understanding of this world's nobles, believing that this kind of manual labor was work for servants, so he had never thought of using the Proficiency Panel to practice the forging skill.

But now he was far too short on money. There was no helping it; the territory lacked talent and also lacked resources.

So he could only take the field personally. It just so happened that the brute strength and energy brought by cultivating the Breathing Technique had nowhere to vent.

And just now, after he had observed the entire forging process once in Little Milan's blacksmith shop, sure enough, a new skill appeared on his Proficiency Panel: Forging.

"As long as it can appear on the Proficiency Panel, then it's simple. I just have to grind it."

Over the next few days, Levi sent people to relocate the blacksmith shop, having Little Milan and the other blacksmith apprentices move the forging equipment around his castle. He also built a crude smelting blast furnace using local methods, making it convenient for him to learn forging normally.

Little Milan was also overwhelmed by the favor. He had not expected the Lord to actually be willing to become his apprentice. This was far too close to the people.

Just like that, Levi had more and more skills he needed to grind.

However, he knew their order of priority.

The Breathing Technique was always first, then Golden Cross Slash, and only after that came Forging and Animal Taming.

In just one month, Levi's Forging reached the Second Order.

The speed was much faster than he had imagined.

For this kind of life skill, grinding experience was too fast.

It was much easier than combat skills.

In his previous life, Levi had heard that if a person could focus wholeheartedly on one thing for a thousand hours, they could very easily master many things that seemed difficult in our perception.

Time was the best teacher, and human potential was also far higher than we imagined. Constant practice was the most important key to mastering all of this.

Combined with the cheat-like Proficiency Panel, where every bit of effort was certain to bring a bit of harvest and positive feedback was given at all times.

For Levi, learning these ordinary skills could be said to be a piece of cake.

Three months later, he had successfully forged a Fine Quality Knight Sword, and it was not inferior at all to the one Little Milan had given him.

Of course, the "fine quality" by this world's standards could only be considered trash in his previous life. After all, smelting technology was backward, so it was impossible to produce high-quality iron.

And Levi did not know how to improve these things. The Proficiency Panel also had no way to conjure advanced smelting technology out of nothing.

In any case, this perfect casting directly increased his proficiency by 100 points.

This made Little Milan, who had spent four years as a blacksmith apprentice before successfully forging a fine Knight Sword, feel the disparity of the world for the first time.